ST MARY’S CATHOLIC PRIMARY SCHOOL
NEWSLETTER APRIL 2017
Welcome back to the summer term. I hope you had an enjoyable Easter break and your child will soon settle back into the school routine. It was so lovely to see all of the children coming back happy and well refreshed after the holiday. We are already almost at the end of the school year with only six weeks to go to half term and then only seven weeks to the end of the school year! Time certainly seems to be going by very quickly.
Easter Celebrations
Thank you to the children from Years 3 and 4 for leading the Palm Sunday Mass so well. It was wonderful to see so many children participating this year. You processed into Church and joined in the responses with great enthusiasm – thank you children.
Thank you to the volunteers from Year 6 for your very moving dramatisation of the Stations of the Cross both before the Easter holidays and on Good Friday. You were excellent.
Enfield Dance Festival
Well done to the children from our school who represented the school in the Dance Festival at the Millfield Theatre this year. You were wonderful. Thank you to the teachers for their hard work in preparing the children.
Easter Performances
The children in Year 3 are to be congratulated for their wonderful performance of ‘Tuishi Pamoja’. All worked hard and co-operated so well to prepare. The singing, dancing and speaking were of such a high quality. I could see from the faces of all in the audience how much parents and friends of the school enjoyed the performances. Thank you very much children for your hard work. Also a sincere thank you to the teachers, teaching assistants and volunteers who spent many hours of their own time planning and preparing and then guiding the children through. Thank you to the parents who helped with practices, scenery and costumes. £200.26 was earned in voluntary contributions for tickets.
Wednesday Word
Starting on Wednesday 17th April 2013 your child began to bring The Wednesday Word leaflet home from school. The Wednesday Word is a gift to you and your family because of your connection with our Catholic school.
Every Wednesday, a ‘word’ (inspired by the Sunday Gospel) will be suggested for you and your family to talk about in your home.
This weekly Family Time is structured around the Sunday Gospel because evidence shows that Gospel values really do help family relationships to thrive.
Regularly spending quality time with children is without doubt one of the most important aspects of parenting. The Wednesday Word seeks to support you in this important task: to help you and your children maintain a special closeness throughout the school years.
The Wednesday Word 'Family Time' leaflet is designed to ensure that all family members feel included. It presents an effective way for even the busiest of parents to enrich relationships with their children through spending a very special 5 or 10 minutes together each week.
We suggest Wednesdays for Family Time because it is the day that the Catholic Church dedicates to St Joseph – the Patron Saint of Families. But rather than miss out, any other night would do just as well.
Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning (SEAL)
We continue until the end of this half-term with the fifth SEAL theme ‘Good to be Me’.
This theme explores how children can motivate themselves in their learning and across the school. As part of the theme they will be asked to set their own goals, think about how they learn best and consider how they might make wise choices.
Your child will bring home some homework activities linked to this topic as we really value the support you can give in addressing this area of SEAL.
Walk to School on Wednesday
We are delighted that more and more children are walking / cycling / scooting etc (rather than coming by car) to school at least one day each week.
Leading Parent Partnership Award
Something that we really value in school and which definitely adds to the ethos of the school and the success of our children is the wonderful support we receive from parents.
Over a number of school years we discussed in school how we could work to ensure that our school’s provision for both children and parents was of a high standard. We know from our last very rigorous OFSTED inspection that the school is graded as a good school (judged to be an outstanding school by inspectors from Westminster for the Catholic Life of the School and very good for Religious Education). Regular visits from representatives of the local authority and Diocese of Westminster as well as in school evaluation systems have shown this judgement to be valid and consistent.
We took the decision a few years ago to work towards achieving the LPPA (Leading Parent Partnership Award) and then subsequently to renew the award. This means that the school’s contribution towards working with parents is looked at and evaluated. This is a voluntary process for the school but we decided to work towards achieving the award as a means of further improving our school’s provision for pupils. As you know the school was twice awarded the LPPA Award following a number of inspections which were carried out by OFSTED trained assessors.
We have continued this year to have regular information evenings for parents and ‘Bring Your Parent / Grandparent’ to school events. Thank you for your excellent support for these events and your very positive and constructive verbal and written evaluations.
Basic Skills Award
As many of you are aware the school community was awarded the Basic Skills Quality Mark last school year. This
(voluntary process) looks at the extent to which literacy, numeracy and ICT skills are embedded across the curriculum. The fundamental principles of this process, such as the involvement of the whole school community, self-review and targeted intervention, are central to our school’s improvement agenda. This quality mark provides a framework for self-evaluation and continuous improvement of the basic skills of all pupils in the school.
The quality mark focuses on ten key elements:
· A whole school strategy and planning to improve performance in basic skills.
· An analysis of the assessment of pupil performance in basic skills.
· Target setting for the improvement of the school’s performance in basic skills.
· Basic skills improvement planning for pupils under- attaining and / or under-achieving.
· Regular review of the progress made by pupils under-attaining and / or under-achieving in basic skills.
· A commitment to improving the skills of staff to teach and extend basic skills.
· The use of a range of teaching approaches and learning styles to improve basic skills.
· The use of appropriate teaching and learning materials to improve basic skills.
· The involvement of parents and carers in developing their child’s basic skills.
· An effective procedure for monitoring planning and assessing improvement in performance in basic skills.
We have continued to have a basic skills team in school and continue to review progress regularly.
Accident and Emergency Closure!
The Accident and Emergency (A&E) department at Chase Farm Hospital, The Ridgeway, Enfield closed on 9th December 2013. PATIENTS requiring emergency treatment will no longer be treated at Chase Farm Hospital.
This means that any patients needing life-saving treatment will now need to go to either North Middlesex Hospital or Barnet Hospital.
Barnet Hospital
Wellhouse Lane
Barnet
EN5 3DJ
Telephone 0845 111 4000 or 020 8216 4600
North Middlesex University Hospital NHS Trust
Sterling Way
London
Greater London
N18 1QX
Telephone: 020 8887 2000
The Chase Farm Hospital site will continue to provide an urgent care centre for less serious illness or injuries such as sprains, suspected broken bones, wounds, minor burns etc. which is open 12 hours a day from 9am-9pm, 7 days per week, 365 days per year to provide care for non-life threatening emergencies.
Chase Farm Hospital
The Ridgeway
Enfield EN2 8JL
Telephone 0845 111 4000 or 020 8375 2999
Thinking Skills
Remember to ask your child which thinking hats they have been using in lessons. Also check to see if they are aware of the current Habit of Mind focus. Some of the children are also using the Thinking Maps – ask your child to see if he / she is aware of the maps.
Birthday Celebrations!
It is lovely that so many children now like to celebrate their birthdays by bringing in sweets for their classmates.
Please remember though parents that different parents have different rules about sweets and the kinds of sweets their children are allowed to eat.
If it is your child’s birthday, and you do want to mark the day, please just send in one very small bar for each child. It is probably better to send a known brand of chocolate with which all parents are familiar rather than lots of very sugary sweets or party bags. Lollipops and hard sweets are not permitted for health and safety reasons.
Remember you are not obliged to send in sweets at all.
Absence
During the spring term we have had a number of pupil absences. The absences were mainly due to lots of coughs, colds, bouts of flu and tummy bugs. Some children continued to catch Chicken Pox last term.
It’s very important that we really try during this new term to continue to improve pupil attendance. Our target is not to let our attendance fall (our absence was 2.56% at the end of the spring term – this is higher than we would like it to be).
We are required now also to report on Persistent Absence.
The DfE's persistent absence threshold is 10% from Autumn 2015!
The DfE's guidance on the 2014/15 school census explains that from the 2015/2016 academic year onwards, a pupil will be considered to be persistently absent if he/she is away for over 10% of school sessions in an academic year.
Pages 72-73 of the DfE's guidance, linked to above, contains a table which sets out the estimated thresholds that will be used to define persistently absent pupils.
15 per cent / 10 per centHalf-term 1 / 10 or more sessions / 7 or more sessions
Half term 1-2 (autumn term) / 22 or more sessions / 14 or more sessions
Half term 1-3 / 30 or more sessions / 20 or more sessions
Half-term 1-4 (autumn term and spring term combined) / 38 or more sessions / 25 or more sessions
Half term 1-5 / 46 or more sessions / 31 or more sessions
Half term 1-6 (full academic year) / 56 or more sessions / 38 or more sessions
Please (unless of course your child is ill) ensure your child is in school each day.
If your child is away from school it is important that you always let us know to avoid having the absence recorded as unauthorised. Always try to phone us on the day and it is school policy to request a short written note explaining the absence.
100% Attendance Spring 2017
201 pupils had 100% attendance. Well done children and parents! This is excellent!
SATs
It’s that time of the year again! Year 6 will begin their SATs on Monday 8th May. The other junior classes will also complete the Optional SATs for their year group and Year 2 children will complete their assessments during the summer term too. It’s very important that all children are in school each day and especially during this time of assessment.
Tissues
We are no longer able to provide tissues for classrooms.
Donations of boxes of tissues would be gratefully received. Thank you to parents who have already handed in some boxes. Unfortunately we are running low again.
Own Clothes Day – 31st March
£217.57 was donated. Thank you parents and children.
School Uniform
Try to ensure your child’s name is on each item of uniform. During the summer children take off sweat shirts a lot more. If the sweatshirt is labelled it is much easier to return it to its owner.
It’s good for children to be able to wear a hat during the summer when it becomes very warm. School hats (with neck protection flaps) are now available from the School Office for £3.00. Children are encouraged to wear these instead of other non - uniform baseball caps which are not permitted.
Thank you to the great number of parents who ensure their children wear the correct school uniform each day.
Vouchers
Thank you for the great support with the Active Kids vouchers this year. Please send in any remaining vouchers as soon as possible.
Recycling
Send in any used cartridges
for recycling please.
We are recycling shoes too at the moment. Send in any old pairs.
Be on Time!
Try very hard to ensure your child is on time for school each day (in the classroom before 9am registration) and that he/she is picked up promptly at the end of the day.
Allowing your child to be regularly late in the morning and collecting children well after 3pm (infants) / 3.15pm (juniors) is not good practice. It’s good for children to learn good habits of punctuality from a young age.
Again thank you to the numerous parents who ensure their children are on time every day.
In order to avoid any confusion or worry please always let us know if you have made arrangements for another family member or parent, a friend or new childminder to pick your child up at the end of the day.
School Meals
We started our ‘right choice’ menu well over two years ago. As I know you are aware we have worked with our provider of school meals to improve the quality of the cooked meals given to our children at lunchtime.